Moore married her first husband Henry Kuttner in 1940, and most of her work from 1940 to 1958 (Kuttner's death) was written by the couple collaboratively. They were prolific co-authors under their own names, although more often under any one of several pseudonyms.

As "Catherine Kuttner", she had a brief career as a television scriptwriter from 1958 to 1962. She retired from writing in 1963.

Writing career

The Vagabond, a student-run magazine at Indiana University, published three of her stories when she was a student there. The three short stories, all with a fantasy theme and all credited to "Catherine Moore", appeared in 1930/31.[1] Her first professional sales appeared in pulp magazines beginning in 1933. Her decision to publish under the name "C.L. Moore" stemmed not from a desire to hide her gender, but to keep her employers at Fletcher Trust from knowing that she was working as a writer on the side.

Her early work included two significant series in Weird Tales, then edited by Farnsworth Wright. One features the rogue and adventurer Northwest Smith wandering through the Solar System; the other features the swordswoman/warrior Jirel of Joiry, one of the first female protagonists in sword-and-sorcery fiction. Both series are sometimes named for their lead characters.[2] One of the Northwest Smith stories, "Nymph of Darkness" (Fantasy Magazine (April 1935); expurgated version, Weird Tales (Dec 1939)), was written in collaboration with Forrest J Ackerman.[3]

The most famous Northwest Smith story is "Shambleau", which was also Moore's first professional sale. It originally appeared in the November 1933 issue of Weird Tales,[2] netting her $100, and later becoming a popular anthology reprint.

Her most famous Jirel story is also the first one, "Black God's Kiss", which was the cover story in the October 1934 issue of Weird Tales, subtitled "the weirdest story ever told" (see figure).[2] Moore's early stories were notable for their emphasis on the senses and emotions, which was unusual in genre fiction at the time.

Moore's work also appeared in Astounding Science Fiction magazine throughout the 1940s. Several stories written for that magazine were later collected in her first published book, Judgment Night (1952)[4][2][a] One of them, the novella "No Woman Born" (1944), was to be included in more than 10 different science fiction anthologies including The Best of C. L. Moore.[5]

Included in that collection were "Judgment Night" (first published in August and September 1943), the lush rendering of a future galactic empire with a sober meditation on the nature of power and its inevitable loss; "The Code" (July 1945), an homage to the classic Faust with modern theories and Lovecraftian dread; "Promised Land" (February 1950) and "Heir Apparent" (July 1950), both documenting the grim twisting that mankind must undergo in order to spread into the Solar System; and "Paradise Street" (September 1950), a futuristic take on the Old West conflict between lone hunter and wilderness-taming settlers.

Marriage to Henry Kuttner and literary collaborations

Moore met Henry Kuttner, also a science fiction writer, in 1936 when he wrote her a fan letter under the impression that "C. L. Moore" was a man. They soon collaborated on a story that combined Moore's signature characters, Northwest Smith and Jirel of Joiry: "Quest of the Starstone" (1937).

Moore and Kuttner married in 1940 and thereafter wrote many of their stories in collaboration, sometimes under their own names, but more often using the joint pseudonyms C. H. Liddell, Lawrence O'Donnell, or Lewis Padgett — most commonly the latter, a combination of their mothers' maiden names. Moore still occasionally wrote solo work during this period, including the frequently anthologized "No Woman Born" (1944). A selection of Moore's solo short fiction work from 1942 through 1950 was collected in 1952's Judgement Night. Moore's only solo novel, Doomsday Morning appeared in 1957.

The vast majority of Moore's work in the period, though, was written as part of a very prolific partnership. Working together, the couple managed to combine Moore's style with Kuttner's more cerebral storytelling. They continued to work in sf and fantasy, and their works include two frequently anthologized sf classics: "Mimsy Were the Borogoves" (February 1943), the basis for the film The Last Mimzy (2007), and "Vintage Season" (September 1946), the basis for the film Timescape (1992). As "Lewis Padgett" they also penned two mystery novels: The Brass Ring (1946) and The Day He Died (1947).

Career after Kuttner's death

After Kuttner's death in 1958, Moore continued teaching her writing course at the University of Southern California but permanently retired from writing any further literary fiction. Instead, working as "Catherine Kuttner", she carved out a short-lived career as a scriptwriter for Warner Brothers television, writing episodes of the westerns Sugarfoot, Maverick, and The Alaskans, as well as the detective series 77 Sunset Strip, all between 1958 and 1962. However, upon marrying Thomas Reggie (who was not a writer) in 1963, she ceased writing entirely.

Later life

She developed Alzheimer's disease but that was not obvious for several years. She had ceased to attend the meetings when she was nominated to be the first woman Grand Master of the Science Fiction Writers of America; the nomination was withdrawn at the request of her husband, Thomas Reggie, who said the award and ceremony would be at best confusing and likely upsetting to her, given the progress of her disease.[7] That caused dismay among the former SFWA presidents, for she was a great favorite to receive the award.[clarification needed] (Former presidents and current officers select a living writer as Grand Master of SF, no more than one annually.)[8]

The Best of C. L. Moore, edited by Lester Del Rey (Nelson Doubleday, 1975)—includes a biographical introduction by Lester Del Rey, which is carefully noncommittal about the influence of her personal life on her writing, and an autobiographical afterword by Moore

Notes

^In 1951 Gnome had published Tomorrow and Tomorrow and the Fairy Chessmen, the omnibus edition of two short novels by Moore & Kuttner as Lewis Padgett, which had been two-part serials in Astounding during 1947 and 1946. Judgment Night comprised five stories by Moore alone—none from the Northwest Smith and Jirel series, which Gnome collected in part one year later.[2]

References

^ abcdeC. L. Moore at the Internet Speculative Fiction Database (ISFDB). Retrieved 2013-04-20. Select a title to see its linked publication history and general information. Select a particular edition (title) for more data at that level, such as a front cover image or linked contents.